����ֱ��

WASHINGTON: A powerful American bunker-busting bomb is the only weapon capable of destroying Iran’s deeply buried nuclear facilities, making it President Donald Trump’s weapon of choice if he chooses to militarily back Israel.

The GBU-57, a 30,000-pound (13,607 kg) warhead capable of penetrating 200 feet (61 meters) underground before exploding, is missing from Israel’s arsenal despite its stated goal of preventing Iran from building a nuclear bomb.

In less than a week, the Israeli army has taken out Iranian military commanders and damaged numerous surface installations, raising more questions than answers.

“The regime’s missile stockpiles, launchers, military bases, production facilities, nuclear scientists, military command and control has taken a very severe beating,” said Behnam Ben Taleblu, director of the Iran program at the Washington-based think tank Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a conservative-leaning group.

“But there are still outsized questions as to how efficacious of a strike Israel had against the beating hearts of Iran’s nuclear program,” Taleblu said.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has reported no damage at Fordo, a uranium enrichment plant south of Tehran. Unlike the Natanz and Isfahan sites in central Iran, Fordo is buried deep underground, beyond the reach of Israeli bombs.

“All eyes will be on Fordo, which is buried under about 300 feet of rock in central Iran,” Taleblu said.

Former US Army lieutenant general and Rand Corporation defense researcher Mark Schwartz insists that “only the United States has the conventional capacity” to destroy such a site.

And by “conventional capacity,” he means the non-nuclear GBU-57 bomb.

The US military says the GBU-57 – also named Massive Ordnance Penetrator – “is designed to penetrate up to 200 feet underground before exploding,” navigating through rock and concrete.

This differs from missiles or bombs that typically detonate their payload near or upon impact.

“To defeat these deeply buried targets, these weapons need to be designed with rather thick casings of steel, hardened steel, to sort of punch through these layers of rock,” said Masao Dahlgren, a fellow working on missile defense for the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington-based research center.

The 6.6-meter-long GBU-57 also has a specialized fuse because “you need an explosive that’s not going to immediately explode under that much shock and pressure,” Dahlgren said.

Design for this bomb began in the early 2000s, and an order for 20 units was placed with Boeing in 2009.

The only aircraft capable of deploying the GBU-57 is an American B-2 Bomber, a stealth aircraft.

Some of these bombers were deployed in early May on Diego Garcia, the site of a joint UK-US military base in the Indian Ocean, but were no longer visible by mid-June, according to AFP’s analysis of satellite imagery provided by Planet Labs.

With their long-range capabilities, B-2s departing from the United States “are able to fly all the way to the Middle East to do bombing runs. That’s been done before,” Dahlgren said.

Each B-2 can carry two GBU-57 bombs, and Schwartz said multiple bombs will likely be needed.

“They’re not going to just be one and done,” he said.

Schwartz added that the air superiority Israel has established over Iran reduces the risks faced by the B-2 bombers.

Such a US intervention would come with “a lot of political baggage for America,” Taleblu said, emphasizing that the bunker-buster bomb is not the only way to address Iran’s nuclear program.

Without the GBU-57 bombs, and short of a diplomatic solution, Taleblu said Israelis could attack access to underground complexes like Fordo by “trying to hit entrances, collapse what they can, cut electricity” and take other measures that have already been taken at Natanz.

LEMBATA, Indonesia: Indonesia’s Mount Lewotobi Laki Laki erupted with giant ash and smoke plumes again Wednesday after forcing evacuations of villages and flight cancelations, including to and from the resort island of Bali.
Several eruptions sent ash up to 5,000 meters (16,400 feet) into the sky Tuesday evening to Wednesday afternoon. An eruption Tuesday afternoon sent thick, gray clouds 10,000 meters (about 32,800 feet) into the sky that expanded into a mushroom-shaped ash cloud visible as much as 150 kilometers (nearly 93 miles) away.
The eruption alert was raised Tuesday to the highest level and the danger zone where people are recommended to leave was expanded to 8 kilometers (about 5 miles) from the crater.
Officers also evacuated from the Mount Lewotobi Laki Laki monitoring post 7 kilometers (4.3 miles) from the crater to avoid falling gravel released in the eruption. No casualties have been reported.
Ash and debris fell in a number of places outside the danger zone, including the villages of Boru, Hewa and Watobuku. Some residents from Nurabelen village in Ile Bura subdistrict fled to evacuation sites in Konga to avoid the impact of the eruption, the National Disaster Management Agency said in a statement.
“Some residents have also evacuated to Nileknoheng village, which is 12 kilometers (7.4 miles) from the crater,” said Abdul Muhari, the National Disaster Management Agency’s spokesperson.
Dozens of flights Wednesday were canceled, including those connecting Bali to cities in Australia, Malaysia, India and China, according to the website of Bali’s I Gusti Ngurah Rai International Airport. Volcanic ash can pose a risk to plane engines.
Flights also were canceled to and from the international airport in Labuan Bajo another tourist destination in Flores Island, East Nusa Tenggara province. The airport is still operating.
The cancelations and delays affected thousands of travelers. Australian carrier Jetstar, which flies daily between the tourist hotspot and several Australian cities, said the ash cloud was forecast to clear by late Wednesday and its services would be rescheduled.
Air New Zealand canceled one return trip to Auckland and would rebook customers on the next available service, the airline said in a statement Wednesday. Flights to New Delhi, Singapore and Pudong, China, were also canceled due to the volcano, according to information on the website for Denpasar airport in Bali.
The 1,584-meter (5,197-foot) Mount Lewotobi Laki Laki is a twin volcano with Mount Lewotobi Perempuan in the district of Flores Timur.
The volcano has had several eruptions, and its danger level and no-go zone have changed several times before being raised again to the highest level Tuesday.
An eruption of Mount Lewotobi Laki Laki in November killed nine people and injured dozens. It also erupted in March.
Indonesia is an archipelago of 270 million people with frequent seismic activity. It has 120 active volcanoes and sits along the “Ring of Fire,” a horseshoe-shaped series of seismic fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.